Skip navigation.

suit - What does it mean?

Definition of 'suit'

English

Noun

(en-noun)
  • A set of clothes to be worn together, now especially a man's matching jacket and trousers (also business suit or lounge suit), or a similar outfit for a woman.
  • * {{quote-book|year=1963|author=(Margery Allingham)|title=(The China Governess)
  • |chapter=Foreword citation |passage=A canister of flour from the kitchen had been thrown at the looking-glass and lay like trampled snow over the remains of a decent blue suit with the lining ripped out which lay on top of the ruin of a plastic wardrobe.}}
  • * {{quote-magazine|date=2013-08-03|volume=408|issue=8847|magazine=(The Economist)
  • |title= Revenge of the nerds |passage=Think of banking today and the image is of grey-suit ed men in towering skyscrapers. Its future, however, is being shaped in converted warehouses and funky offices in San Francisco, New York and London, where bright young things in jeans and T-shirts huddle around laptops, sipping lattes or munching on free food.}}
  • (by extension) A single garment that covers the whole body: space suit, boiler suit, protective suit.
  • (pejorative|slang) A person who wears matching jacket and trousers, especially a boss or a supervisor.
  • A full set of armour.
  • (legal) The attempt to gain an end by legal process; a process instituted in a court of law for the recovery of a right or claim; a lawsuit.
  • (obsolete) The act of following or pursuing; pursuit, chase.
  • Pursuit of a love-interest; wooing, courtship.
  • Rebate your loves, each rival suit suspend, Till this funereal web my labors end. —(Alexander Pope).
  • The full set of sails required for a ship.
  • (card games) Each of the sets of a pack of cards distinguished by color and/or specific emblems, such as the spades, hearts, diamonds and French playing cards.
  • To deal and shuffle, to divide and sort Her mingled suits and sequences. — (William Cowper).
  • (obsolete) Regular order; succession.
  • Every five and thirty years the same kind and suit of weather comes again. — (Francis Bacon).
  • (obsolete) The act of suing; the pursuit of a particular object or goal.
  • Thenceforth the suit of earthly conquest shone. — (Edmund Spenser).
  • (archaic) A company of attendants or followers; a retinue.
  • (archaic) A group of similar or related objects or items considered as a whole; a suite (of rooms etc.)
  • Derived terms

    * birthday suit * bring suit * diving suit * flight suit * follow suit * out of suits (rel-mid3) * pressure suit * shell suit * suit and service * suit broker * suit court * suit covenant (rel-mid3) * suit custom * suit service * suitcase * swimsuit * tracksuit * zoot suit (rel-bottom)

    See also

    *

    Verb

    (en-verb)
  • To make proper or suitable; to adapt or fit.
  • *(William Shakespeare) (c.1564–1616)
  • *:Let your own discretion be your tutor: suit the action to the word, the word to the action.
  • To be suitable or apt for one's image.
  • :
  • :
  • To be appropriate or apt for.
  • :
  • *(John Dryden) (1631-1700)
  • :Ill suits his cloth the praise of railing well.
  • *(Matthew Prior) (1664-1721)
  • *:Raise her notes to that sublime degree / Which suits song of piety and thee.
  • *
  • *:“[…] it is not fair of you to bring against mankind double weapons ! Dangerous enough you are as woman alone, without bringing to your aid those gifts of mind suited to problems which men have been accustomed to arrogate to themselves.”
  • (lb) To dress; to clothe.
  • *(William Shakespeare) (c.1564–1616)
  • *:So went he suited to his watery tomb.
  • To please; to make content; as, he is well suited with his place; to fit one's taste.
  • :
  • (lb) To agree; to accord; to be fitted; to correspond; — usually followed by to'', archaically also followed by ''with .
  • *(John Dryden) (1631-1700)
  • *:The place itself was suiting to his care.
  • *(Joseph Addison) (1672-1719)
  • *:Give me not an office / That suits with me so ill.
  • Synonyms

    * to agree: agree, match, answer

    Derived terms

    * suited and booted * suit up * suit yourself